Multimedia Reporting (Bradford-Utsler)

In the dugout, Kevin Tucker isn’t the type of baseball coach who lets his ego get in the way of how he works with his players. Instead, he often brainstorms with players and, with his guidance, his players are able to make adjustments and improve themselves as players.

Away from the diamond, Tucker is a beach boy surrounded by an ocean of wheat and sunflowers. A San Luis Obispo, Calif., native, Tucker would love nothing more, than to return to coastal California someday as a head coach at the collegiate level.

Tucker is currently an assistant coach on the Kansas baseball team, but his background in coaching can be traced all the way back to Sweden, where he was a player/coach. He also spent three summers overseas as a Major League Baseball Envoy Coach in Africa, France and Germany.

“I got to see different cultures, views, people and be around baseball. It’s fun to network with people all over the world that just have one thing in common – baseball,” Tucker said. “It was a great experience, I wouldn’t change it for the world.”

Click image to see where Tucker has played and coached in his career.

Tucker’s coaching career began before his playing days ended. While at Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo in 1994, Tucker found out from his roommate that a player/coach position was available in Escosura, Sweden. With his playing days nearing an end, Tucker realized he needed to become a coach if he was to remain involved in baseball. Without hesitation, he took the job.

Tucker arrived in Sweden in 1995 and said the experience was unique in that he was brought on to be a coach, but was young enough that he played on the team, as well.

“I’m lacing them up and playing center field and then barking out first-to-third plays from center and calling the signs at third base when I wasn’t playing,” Tucker said.

Tucker’s first coaching gig in the States came in 1997 at San Luis Obispo High School as an assistant coach. Two years later, Tucker took an assistant coaching job at Hancock College in Santa Maria, Calif., where he played from 1990 to 1991.

But for three straight summers from 1999 to 2001, Tucker coached abroad as a MLB Envoy Coach. As an Envoy coach, his duty was to help baseball grow in Europe, where baseball was about as popular as cricket in America.

In 1999, Tucker coached in Nigeria and Cameroon, Africa. The next summer his mainstay was Paris, France, but he said he bounced around to several surrounding cities to coach. Finally, in 2001, Tucker coached in Stuttgart and Hamburg, Germany.

Tucker said the experience was difficult because baseball was new to so many of the players he coached. What made his job easy was that everyone he coached was eager to soak up everything there was to learn about the sport.

His most memorable moment abroad came during his time in Africa. He said the country’s baseball resources were so terrible, his teams often practiced on old soccer fields with a limited amount of baseballs. But before he left, a catcher he coached in the All-African Games ended up getting drafted by the Milwaukee Brewers. Tucker said he not only felt good for the player for getting out of a third-world country to make something of himself in America, but also for the country, which “revolved” around the hopes and dreams of this single baseball player.

“To see a guy that came from nothing, but had the pure ability and the heart to finally get a shot for someone to take him was…I can’t even describe it,” Tucker said.

Despite his worldly travels, Tucker doesn’t claim to have mastered any foreign languages.

“I’ve always learned the basics and I always feel like I don’t want to be that stupid American that wasn’t trying to filter in or not learn the language,” Tucker said.

As much as Tucker enjoyed his travels as a coach, when he moved to Kansas to coach alongside head coach Ritch Price and assistant coach Ryan Graves, with whom Tucker coached at Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo, he had moments of doubt as to whether Kansas was the place for him.

Tucker said the offseasons were the hardest on him because he was so far away from the people he usually spent time with outside of baseball. To make matters worse, he could no longer take part in his favorite hobby – surfing. But during the season, he felt right at home.

“Once baseball season got going, it was where I wanted to be and I knew that’s what I wanted to do and I can’t ask for any better coaches to be around,” Tucker said.

As an assistant coach at Kansas, Tucker’s responsibilities are coaching hitters and outfielders. His maxim is he will help any player, at any time and when he works with them, he combines his coaching theories with what the player is comfortable with.

On several occasions after games this season, Kansas hitters gave Tucker credit for their performances. Senior outfielder Matt Baty said one thing Tucker stressed was for his hitters to try to go the opposite way when batting and not try to pull the ball all the time. Baty said once the team started taking his advice, it saw results.

Click image to see how Morrison has improved after 45 games in 2006 from his 2005 totals with Tucker's help.

Sophomore third baseman Erik Morrison batted .221 as a freshman with just three home runs and a .319 slugging percentage. Forty-five games into his sophomore season, Morrison is experiencing anything but a sophomore slump. Instead, with Tucker's help, Morrison’s batting average is up to .285, he's already hit 10 home runs and his slugging has increased to .544.

“He doesn’t really try to hammer too much stuff in your brain,” Morrison said. “He lets you make your choices, make your decisions at what you want to do, what you think you need to do.

“If we want to come down here and hit at one in the morning, that guy will be down here to hit with us. He’ll do anything for us.”

Morrison’s bond with Tucker is different than most players in that he, too, is from California. He heard about Tucker when he was 13 years old, but he never got to play for him. Instead, his most vivid memory of Tucker comes from his surfing days.

“When I was back home, I used to see that old man out in the water surfing with me,” Morrison said.

Tucker said success stories like Morrison are the most rewarding part of the job.

“When they flourish in a game and they get it done, they might give you a little wink or point at you to kind of say, ‘Hey, thanks,’ it makes it all worth it, knowing you spent boatloads of hours in the cages and boatloads of hours out on the field,” Tucker said.

While such experiences make the job worthwhile for Tucker, the times when a player tries, but doesn’t succeed are the hardest on him.

“I’ll never turn away a kid that wants to keep working,” Tucker said. “That’s the tough part, when they know they have the ability, but it’s just not sinking in mentally. It’ll drive you bonkers as a coach.”

Price has known Tucker for years and praised his dedication to his job. Price even said he thought of Tucker, 35, as one of the best young coaches in America. The main reason was how Tucker could get the most out of his players.

“He has a great personality for teaching hitting,” Price said. “He’s not overly intense, he’s not overbearing. He’s very calm in his demeanor and his approach. I think he’s a really good teacher.”

Tucker’s coaching days abroad appear to be over, but odds are he will be on the move again within the U.S. in the next few years. With the connections Tucker has made along with his lengthy résumé, he’s already considered where his next step up the coaching ladder might take him.

Price gave Tucker permission to coach Little Falls of the New York Collegiate Baseball League this summer and return to Kansas in the fall, but Tucker said he would ultimately like to return to the west coast to coach someday.

In exchange for the comforts of coaching in the Big 12 conference, Tucker would be reunited with family, friends and beaches. However, the chance to remove “assistant” from his job title might be the deciding factor.

“I know, wherever I go, it’s not going to be as good as it is here, but at the same time, I want to find my own identity at one point,” Tucker said. “Every coach wants to move on and be a head guy somewhere and that’s kind of my goal.”